Press release 29.11.2021
A Journey with Objects - Sámi Cultural Heritage at MARKK with Áile Aikio and Fumi Takayanagi
Thursday 9 December 2021 at 7 pm
Zwischenraum, MARKK, Museum am Rothenbaum, Kulturen und Künste der Welt
PROGRAMME
Áile Aikio: Introduction to Sámi cultural heritageFumi Takayanagi: Introduction to the Sámi collection at MARKK
A dialogical performative lecture about the research residency
Engaging one object of the collection in conversation with the audience
Indigenous self-determination calls into question museum ownership of objects in Indigenous collections, the meaning of cultural heritage, and who has access to it.
While restitution is a burning question for museums in Germany, the Finnish National Museum returns its Sámi collection (over 2000 objects) to the Sámi Museum Siida in Anár (Northern Sámi)/Aanaar (Inari Sámi)/Aanar (Skolt Sámi)/Inari (Finnish) in Finnish Sápmi. There are over 2000 objects in the Sámi collections of German museums; of these, at least 400 are in the MARKK.
The Goethe-Institut Finnland is initiating a dialogical research residence to address this current issue by bringing together two scholars, Áile Aikio from Sápmi and Fumi Takayanagi from Germany. The programme promotes the exchange of provenance research between museums in Sápmi and Germany, as well as the social significance of cultural heritage and material culture, collecting practices, and colonial effects on the basis of Sámi collections in Sápmi and Germany.
The two experts, Aikio and Takayanagi, began their exchange at the National Museum of Finland in October 2021 with the opening of the exhibition Mäccmõš, maccâm, máhccan - Homecoming prior to the repatriation of the Sámi collection. For two weeks, Aikio guided Takayanagi through Finnish and Norwegian Sápmi. In December 2021, Aikio joins Takayanagi for a two-week residency, visiting and studying the collections at the Museum MARKK in Hamburg, the Museum of European Cultures (MEK), the Lower Saxony State Museum in Hanover, and the Lübecker Museen. The two researchers will hold their first public conversation on 9 December 2021 at 7 pm in MARKK's Zwischenraum – The Space Between.
The residency programme joins the Goethe-Institut's global discussions on (post-)colonialism and restitution. The Goethe-Institut Finland concentrates on Nordic colonialism, collaborating with the National Museum of Finland, Sámi Museum Siida, MARKK, MEK, and museums in Hannover, Leipzig and Lübeck.
Aikio and Takayanagi's joint residency will develop into a public programme for 2022 in Helsinki, Sápmi, and Germany. This will address central themes of provenance and restitution of objects, the revitalization of cultural heritage, as well as questions of repair.